


We're Building A House Of The Future Together

by OurImpavidHeroine



Series: The Abdication of Hou-Ting LIV or: How Wu Learned to Stop Being Foolish and Love the Detective [15]
Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Negotiations Of All Kinds, Other, Polyamory, Post-Canon, Post-Series, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-19
Updated: 2017-06-19
Packaged: 2018-11-15 22:46:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 17,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11240859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OurImpavidHeroine/pseuds/OurImpavidHeroine
Summary: Prince Wu enters into negotiations for his second marriage.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Marezelle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marezelle/gifts), [Squarehere](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Squarehere/gifts), [unowenowl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/unowenowl/gifts), [peoniequeen (MaddiKate)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaddiKate/gifts), [tortoises_in_love](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tortoises_in_love/gifts), [Scarlettfire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scarlettfire/gifts), [chloenitram88 (chloenightswantsflight)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chloenightswantsflight/gifts).



> A billet-doux for all of my faithful and involved readers who have asked, in many different ways, for this particular story.

Wu sat at the softly gleaming oval table of red elm wood, waiting. The meeting room was expensively and tastefully furnished; the law firm of Shiba, Sotaro, Shao, Sonchai and Bong was the best in Republic City and nothing about them was cheap. Old Sotaro himself was sitting to Wu’s right side, pince-nez perched on his expansive nose, taking notes. He’d been his lawyer since he’d arrived in Republic City as a fifteen year old; put on retainer by his Grand Secretariat, Gun, to care for his interests while he was still underage. He’d always been an excellent advocate and Wu saw no need to make any changes over the years.

Gun was sitting to his left side, a fussy little smile on his face. He’d spent the morning with Meili perched on his knee, his usual strict adherence to royal protocol won over by her winsome charms. “A princess should not be sitting on anyone’s lap,” he’d scolded gently, but he’d been so pleased, Wu could tell. He’d toured Zhi’s collection of specimens with enthusiasm and indeed had brought him a fine example of a certain type of water beetle only found in Lake Laogai, one which he had actually gone out and caught himself. (The idea that Gun, of all people, had been wading about with his skinny old ankles exposed, jar in hand, had sent him dashing out of the room, startling a housemaid with his explosion of laughter.) Zhi had been beyond delighted; in his excitement he had flung his arms around his waist and nearly squeezed the life out of him. Gun had been shocked, of course, but had very carefully returned his hug, tears in his eyes. “My gracious, Prince Yaozhi,” he’d murmured, but he’d kept the embrace up as long as Zhi had let him. Naoki had given him a demonstration with both her bending and her katana; he’d watched intently and then bowed to her when she had finished, stiff with age but with the perfect degree of propriety. “You do great credit to your parents as well as the house of Hou-Ting, Princess,” he’d told her, and she had bowed to him very properly in return.

Lady Chun was to Gun’s other side, elegant as always. He’d sent his airship for her and she’d arrived that morning and had met them at the law offices; after the meeting she’d be joining them back at the house for however long the negotiations took. He was always glad to have her stay with them and he knew the children were anxiously awaiting her arrival. She adored the children as much as they adored her and let them lead her about, showing her their treasures, chattering at her non-stop as she admired everything. He gave her a little smile across Gun and she returned it, her eyes softening.

There was a discreet knock at the door and a secretary opened it. “Your one o’clock has arrived, sir,” he announced, and bowed in a rather severe looking woman, dressed in formal Zaofu robes of green and silver. She was accompanied by Qi, wearing a new sapphire blue suit, hair combed back, a rich shade of scarlet lipstick on Qi’s mouth, eyes made smoky with kohl. Wu’s own eyes narrowed; partly because of the cosmetics but mostly because he’d told Qi that Qi could take advantage of one of the firm’s lawyers to represent Qi. The fact that Qi hadn’t chosen to do that wasn’t all that surprising - Qi never had liked being told what to do - but he was extremely curious as to how and why Qi had engaged a lawyer from Zaofu, of all places. His surprise shifted into amazement, however, when Qi was followed in by Lin, in formal robes herself, the Beifong crest of the flying boar emblazoned over her heart. His mouth dropped open when he looked closer and saw the same crest above Qi’s heart as well.

The lawyer bowed. “Attorney Sotaro?” At the lawyer’s nod she inclined her head. “Attorney Bhimadevi from the Zaofu firm of Bhimadevi and Bhudevi. This is my secretary, Prem.” The slight man walking behind Lin bowed, arms full of files. “I am here to represent my client, Qi Beifong, for marriage negotiations with His Royal Highness.”

Sotaro stood and bowed in return. “Thank you for coming, Attorney Bhimadevi. Please take a seat.”


	2. Chapter 2

Wu had his hands to his mouth, looking around the great hall. “I can’t believe it’s even the same place,” he said, dropping his hands to smile at me. “Oh, Qi, it looks marvelous! I confess, I had just assumed that instead of working you all were up here drinking and smoking and fraternizing with the locals,” he flicked out his fingers in that dismissive way he’d filched from Lin, “or you know, whatever it is people do at hunting lodges.”

I couldn’t help but laugh at him. “I’m not using it as a hunting lodge, you know.”

“I should say not,” he answered me, tucking his arm into mine, like he does. “And I’m gratified to see you got rid of all of the despicable stuffed heads off the wall.” He shuddered and clung to me. “It’s a decor I simply cannot approve of. All the eyes! Staring down at you! Dreadful!”

“Yeah, well, they were the first things to go.” I tugged him along with me, taking him around. I’d had help from some of the locals; a few carpenters to replace the roofs and such and a stonemason to replace the chimneys and fix the chinks in the floors and walls. I’d even hired someone from Republic City to swap out all of the windows. The old ones had still been standing, for the most part, but that’s because they were as thick as my arm and made of lead to boot. You couldn’t see a damn thing out of them. Bolin and Korra had spent a weekend tearing down the ruined remains of the servants’ quarters with their earthbending, breaking up the stone and using it to fix the long, cobblestoned driveway leading in from the iron gate. We’d been able to park the car in front of the house. Wei had fixed the gate as well; he’d told me that I should really have Huan doing it if I wanted it to be perfect but his metalbending was more than enough for me. I’d turned LoLo loose in the kitchen and cellar and he’d banged around in there, happy as a picken in shit, drinking from a who knows how old bottle of whiskey he’d found below ground (lucky it didn’t poison him, Lin would have had my ass if it had) and shouting every time he found something he thought was worth shouting about. Kai's airbending had come in useful when it came to cleaning the place, too. I gave up on trying to salvage any of the old furniture and just told Mako and Korra to burn it all. I had a long way to go before I was ever going to fill the place but I’d managed to replace the basics in a couple of the bedrooms and the kitchen, at least.

It was a lot of work, is what I’m saying. I could have hired people to do it all for me but half the joy of it was being able to spend time with all of them doing exactly what Wu thought we were doing; sleeping outside under the stars, drinking and smoking and swapping stories around a bonfire. But it looked good and smelled even better. The wood was new and polished, the stone had been cleaned and freshly painted and the one sort of fluffy mushroom owlcat spirit that had apparently taken up residence informed me that she was keeping the vermin at bay, which means she’s welcome to stay as far as I’m concerned.

The indoor plumbing had just been finished; I would have never dared bring Wu up here to stay without it. There was electricity hooked up to a generator, too, although it had a tendency to go out a lot. I had a stock of candles and lamps. LoLo had sent along plenty of food, but if we needed more there was a farm a bit down the little road that led up here that was glad to take my yuan for rice and vegetables and such.

I wanted it to be perfect for him and so when he turned to me and took my hands in his, kissing my knuckles, and said, “It’s just splendid, Qi. And we can stay here?” I thought my heart was going to come right out of my chest.

I just shrugged, though. “It’s clean, waterproof, if it gets chilly we can start a fire.” I grinned at the doubtful look on his face. “It’s no Hou-Ting mansion but you think you can manage?”

“Oh, Qi,” he said, and tilted his head at me, rolling his eyes. “Now you’re just being foolish.”

“Yeah well, maybe so, but not so foolish that I can’t go and fetch our bags. Go on, go and run around and see what you want to see while I do that. Do me a favor, though? If you want to go and explore the cellar then take a lamp with you in case the power goes out. It’s pitch black down there.”

He wrinkled his nose at me. “I hardly think I am going to go into a cellar, Qi.” Another flick of those fingers. “Honestly. A cellar. I suppose next we could take a tour of a farm. With animals.”

I stood there, looking at him curling up his lip at the idea of farm animals, and I loved him so much I didn’t know whether I was going to kiss him or what. I had a plan, though, and while it did include a bottle of champagne and a bed it did not include jumping him in the middle of the hallway, so I chose to go and get the bags.


	3. Chapter 3

“Qi Beifong?” Wu’s eyes darted back and forth. “I beg your pardon?” He tried to catch Lin’s eye but she was turned away from him, greeting Lady Chun. Qi simply sat down, hands clasped together politely, waiting. Bhimadevi took papers out of her briefcase, arranging them on the table in front of her, getting out a pen and double checking everything before she put the pen down and addressed his lawyer.

“Before we start, I need to inform you that as of yesterday, the official adoption of Qi by Lin Beifong was approved in Zaofu. Per international law, this morning I filed the papers here in Republic City. My partner is traveling to Ba Sing Se to file them there, as well. I of course have copies for your office.” She pushed across a folder towards Sotaro, who took it and glanced through the contents. “Republic City does recognize legal decisions made in Zaofu.”

Sotaro nodded. “Yes, quite right. These all seem to be in order.” He passed them over to his secretary. “We will, of course, need to amend our drafts with this information. Is it satisfactory to you that we do this on any and all future drafts or would you prefer to correct it by hand in this first provisional draft?”

“Having it on all further drafts would be fine,” she replied.

“Well, I for one would appreciate knowing what this is all about,” Wu said, his breath quickening. “You sat across the table from me at breakfast and mentioned none of this!”

“We’re mentioning it now,” replied Lin. She crossed her arms. “As my heir, I’m here to make sure that Qi’s best interests are being met. It’s the same reason that Lady Chun and the Grand Secretariat are here to advise you.”

“Quite sensible, from a legal standpoint,” added Sotaro, seemingly unperturbed with the sudden revelation of nobility; something that was going to change everything about the entire marriage. Lin, despite her penchant for blithely ignoring her own nobility, must have known it would. 

“A Beifong does require a different kind of contract, certainly,” said Gun, conciliatory as ever. “They are one of the first families.” He nodded respectfully towards Lin. “Before she was married your grandmother Poppy was a lady-in-waiting to Queen Xiaoshurui, the wife of Hou-Ting LI. It was quite an honor.”

Lin actually smiled. “She told us stories about it, my sister and me.”

Lady Chun opened her fan with a soft snick. “Congratulations on achieving motherhood, Lady Beifong.” She smiled slowly. “And what does your sister think of all of this?”

Lin rolled her eyes. “Who do you think put me in touch with the lawyer?”

“Qi?” Wu started to reach across the table before pulling his hand back. “Did you…did you think I would try to cheat you?” He tried to keep the hurt out of his voice.

Qi’s head shook. “It’s not about you. It’s about me.” Qi met his eyes and didn’t waver. “I don’t want to go into this marriage nameless. It’s important to me.”

“But Mako never cared about any of that.”

“I am not Mako.” Qi’s gaze was fierce. “I have never been Mako. I will never be Mako. If you don’t understand that by now then maybe we all need to walk out of this office and forget about it.”

“No one’s walking out of anywhere,” Lin said, mouth drawn in a firm line. “Wu, we will discuss this later. For now, it’s time we let the lawyers do what we’re paying them for.”

“Yes,” said Sotaro. “Now, if you’d give me an approximation of Lady Beifong’s net worth and her liquid assets and what the Honorable Qi could expect to inherit, we can go from there.”

As soon as they started to discuss money Wu tuned them out. Mako had once told him that Lin's net worth was nothing to sneeze at, due for the most part to the Beifong family's mines, still extremely profitable after all these years. He had no idea what on earth Lin did with all of it; she owned her flat downtown and it was a good piece of real estate but certainly nothing flashy. She had a car, her personal belongs of course, but nothing of note. She rarely wore jewelry and her wardrobe was of excellent quality but was nothing lavish. What did she do with all of her Beifong fortune, then?

“Your Highness is not paying attention,” murmured Gun near his ear, just as if he was still a twelve year old schoolboy, bored to tears with one of the weekly court sessions his great-aunt had always made him attend. He shot him a side-eye glance, but Gun merely sniffed at him and then, with the very smallest of gestures, directed his attention back to the lawyers.


	4. Chapter 4

I took our bags into the bedroom and went looking for him; I found him standing in front of a large bronze shield emblazoned with the Hou-Ting crest. I’d found it discarded in one of the far bedrooms; based on the dings and scratches it had seen some heavy use at one time. Wei had offered to fix it for me but I wanted it the way it was. I had had him bend the grime away off of it, though, and had polished it until it shone and then hung it up in the great room.

I stood next to him and he took my hand in his. I don’t think he even knew he was doing it. “Now who do you suppose that belonged to?” he asked, but I knew he wasn’t asking me. He had that distant look on his face, the million miles away one he gets when he’s accessing all of the information stuffed into that brain of his. “I suppose it could have belonged to my great-great grandfather.” He turned to me and smiled. “Where on earth did you salvage it from?”

“One of the back bedrooms. It was stuffed into a wardrobe that was infested with beetles. I rescued it before I had Mako and Korra burn it.”

“Oh.” He blinked and looked around the room. “Well. I don’t suppose there are any beetles left, are there?” He was trying so hard to be casually polite but the disgust in his tone was killing me, it really was.

“No, we’re good to go. Besides, Marezelle let me know she’s keeping that kind of thing at bay.”

He whipped his head around so fast I’m surprised his glasses stayed on. “Marezelle? And who is that, precisely? Is that your housemaid?”

“Nope. She’s the spirit that came with the place. She’s around somewhere, I guess she’ll be along when she wants to.”

One eyebrow slowly rose up to let me know what he thought of that. “You have a spirit.”

“I don’t think anyone has a spirit, not like that. She lives here, that’s all. She’s a little shy, though. It took her awhile to come and talk to me.”

“She speaks.”

“She speaks and she keeps the vermin in check and keeps a general eye on things. I like her.”

“And you named her Marezelle.” He had his hands on his hips now.

“She’s not a pet, Wu. She named herself.”

“Hmph,” was all he had to say to that. Wu is not all that fond of spirits. He tends to lump them into the whole _Loyal Subjects_ category and is always pissed as hell when they won’t do what he tells them to. Nowadays he usually just ignores them so that he can keep on pretending he’s the one in charge.

“You hungry?” I put a hand to his back and guided him towards the kitchen. I’d promised LoLo and Mako both that I’d make sure he ate. “LoLo packed us some food. I thought tomorrow I could go fishing, catch us something fresh for dinner.”

He stopped and clasped his hands together. “In your lake, you mean?”

I grinned. “I didn’t mean I’d drive all the way back to Republic City to fish out of the harbor.” He gave my arm a little push.

“Oh stop, I know you didn’t mean that. I have never been fishing, you know.”

“If you want you can come with me tomorrow.”

“May I?” He lit up before gasping, hand to his mouth. “Oh gracious, you won’t expect me to touch any worms or anything, will you?”

“I will handle all worms. What do you say?”

“Oh Qi! I say it’s marvelous, really splendid.” He tucked his arm into mine. “Oh, how will you cook it? On a spit over a fire like woodsmen do?”

I couldn’t help laughing at him. “If you want, sure. Otherwise I was just going to cook it in a pan back here in the kitchen.”

“Oh no, let’s please have a fire and do it that way.”

“You got it. Now, are you going to be a good boy and eat the dinner I give you today?” I gave him a gentle pull to get him started again. “LoLo took the time to pack us plenty of food.”

“I am a little hungry.” He leaned his head against mine. “Oh Qi, this is like an adventure! Out here in the wilds! No house staff, even! Anything could happen!” His eyes were sparkling. “I have been thinking about writing a book about a woodsman, actually. So this will be very good research. He can go fishing! And build fires!”

“Grill fish on a stick.”

“Yes! Exactly that and…Qi! Are you laughing at me?”

“Just a little bit,” I said, and took him into the kitchen.


	5. Chapter 5

Bhimadevi had an itemized list of Lin’s holdings. Wu glanced over as his lawyer looked through them and was startled. Everyone knew that the Beifongs were wealthy - how else had Su Beifong built an entire city, for goodness sake? - but he had no idea it was quite all that much. He narrowed his eyes at Lin; she merely shrugged a single shoulder and continued to look bored.

“We’ll also need to discuss the actual title.” Bhimadevi cleared her throat and gave Lin a significant look. “Lady Beifong is the eldest child of Lady Toph Beifong and therefore carries the title. As she did not have any issue, the title was to be inherited by her sister’s eldest child, Baatar Beifong, Junior. However, now that she has adopted Qi, the title will be inherited by Qi upon Lady Beifong’s death.” She gave Lin a nod. “May it be far in the future.”

“Ha,” snorted Lin, leaning back in her chair. “Here’s hoping.”

“This does change things,” Bhimadevi continued. “I would expect that you and your client will need to make adjustments accordingly.”

“Yes, of course.” Sotaro tapped for a moment on his paper. “I believe it might be best to adjourn for today and meet again to present an amended draft. The draft we have now is no longer appropriate.”

“I understand,” Bhimadevi said. “And please accept my apologies for the late notice. It was our intention to inform you as soon as it was passed; however, there was a delay in Zaofu.”

“Think nothing of it.” Sotaro turned to Wu. “I believe we could discuss the changes today and tomorrow and have my secretary draft a new proposal then. Would another meeting in three days with your intended’s representatives be acceptable for Your Highness?”

Wu nodded and turned to glance at them. “Gun? Chun? Is it a problem?”

Gun put up a hand. “I am, as always, Your Highness’ devoted servant.”

“It means more time to visit with the children,” Lady Chun smiled. “Of course I can stay.”

“Is this acceptable for you?” Sotaro turned back to Bhimadevi, who nodded. “Excellent. My secretary will provide yours with the new draft as soon as possible. May I ask where you are staying?”

“My secretary and I are at the Four Elements hotel for the duration,” she replied, and her secretary looked up for the first time, a quick glance before continuing with his notes. “I assume it can be delivered there.”

Sotaro nodded. “Of course. And please let me extend the use of our offices. If you need them for any reason at all you need merely ask.”

Bhimadevi inclined her head. “I appreciate the courtesy.” She straightened up her papers. “If that is all, then we will leave you. I look forward to seeing the new draft.” She stood and bowed across the table. “In three days, then.” Her secretary quickly stood up to open the door; Qi looked as if Qi was going to say something, but didn’t, choosing just to walk out.

“We’ll see you back at the house, then,” said Lin, as she followed Qi. Sotaro’s secretary followed them out the door before returning to the room, shutting the door behind him.

“Well, then!” Lady Chun fanned herself. “Oh, those Beifongs always were devious!” She laughed. “This has Suyin Beifong all over it, it really does.”

Gun practically rubbed his hands together with glee. “A Beifong is a very acceptable marriage, Your Highness, my gracious! Oh, this really does change everything.” He was practically levitating out of his chair. “And if there were to be a child-”

“Well, there won’t be,” Wu interrupted. “Qi doesn’t want a child.”

Gun opened his mouth. And then shut it. “But…I don’t understand. A child between the houses of Beifong and Hou-Ting would be more than acceptable, Your Highness. Think of the alliances!”

“In case it has escaped your notice, I am no longer the king and it really doesn’t matter where my children come from. Or is this your way of saying that you don’t accept the children I already have?”

Gun blanched, putting his hands above his heart. “Your Highness…of course not…I didn’t mean…”

“Wu, that was not kind of you. You know how deeply the Grand Secretariat loves the children.” Lady Chun frowned at him. “You also know very well why people would expect you to have a child with Qi, there is no point to pretend otherwise.”

He stood up so suddenly that his chair screeched along the floor, ensuring that even Sotaro’s secretary stared at him. “If you will all excuse me, please,” he said, gritting his teeth, trying to calm his breathing. “I’ll return in just a moment.” He pushed past the secretary with a nod of apology and walked out the door towards the guest bathroom, trying to project an aura of control. 


	6. Chapter 6

It’s not that Wu is stupid; he’s not. He’s got the shrewdest mind I’ve ever seen, that’s for damn sure. There was a part of him that understood why I’d brought him up here, I know. But because he’s Wu he chooses to see what he’s going to see, hear what he’s going to hear, believe what he’s going to believe. It’s just how he is. So if he wanted to blab my ear off during dinner about going fishing and chopping wood and whatever else the woodsman in his new story is apparently going to do then I was going to let him get it out of his system. I knew it was his nerves.

Truth be told, I was a little nervous myself. I’d thought long and hard about whether or not I should bring Mako up here with us. In the end though, I decided that it had to be Wu and me. At least for right now. Wu’s so torn up about this part of it, the whole sex thing, it being me and all. It’s like he wants it, but is afraid of it. He does that a lot; second guesses himself, thinks too much, gets so wrapped up in the thought of things that he gets stuck in place. And yeah, Mako could ease that through; as it is he’s just biding his time, waiting for Wu and me to figure it all out. I appreciate it even though I’d like him to stop being so damn gentlemanly about it! I’ve always believed that the best way to handle things is to grab the komodo rhino by the horn, though, so here we were. For better or worse.

I washed up the few dishes we’d used and he took up a dishtowel to help me out. I couldn’t help giving him a hard time about it; never in my life have I known anyone to be as useless at anything domestic as that man. Don’t get me wrong, I know how he was raised. That’s not his fault. But if Little Miss Snootypants Meili can learn to wash a dish and stitch a sampler the way I’ve taught her then Wu could learn as well. He doesn’t want to, is what it comes down to. I hope he’s never stranded off somewhere on his own, is all that I’m saying. He’d cross his arms and get that stubborn look on his face and starve to death just to prove a point.

Before you get to wondering if I don’t think much of him let me set you straight right now. I think the world of him. It’d be easy for him to do nothing but throw money from on high at those street kids, for example, the way most of his society friends do. He’s sitting with them, though, talking to them, helping them hands on. It was him who taught Spring how to read and write before he sent her off to school, for one thing. I know he cares; in fact he cares too much. He wants to save them all and sometimes it doesn’t work out that way. It doesn’t stop him, though.

I love him, I do, but I’m not about to walk into a marriage with him where he’s still thinking of me as somehow less than his equal. For his sake and my own. He’s used to getting his way, and Mako’s used to letting him have it, for the most part. I’m not Mako. I’m not saying the way he deals with Wu is the wrong way. It’s the Mako way. But I can’t be Mako, and Wu has got to understand that. I’m not convinced he does.

After dinner we went for a stroll outside. I took him down to the lake, told him how I planned on thinning out the forest a bit. It’s pretty overgrown after being abandoned all those years, it’s a damn fire hazard at this point. This started him off on another spiel about the new novel and the woodsman, who might be named Sukarno or Suharto or possibly even Putu. See, I listen. Despite what he said earlier about wanting to have something that was his and his alone I think he’s pretty happy his secret’s out about them now. Before he would have had to sit on his lonesome thinking of names, and he hates being alone. He’d rather follow me around, jabbering about names, occasionally screeching about bugs and using it as an excuse to hang all over me. Before we leave this place I’m going to kiss him. Maybe more. We’ll see if he worries about the damn bugs then. 


	7. Chapter 7

He stepped into the bathroom and locked the door, his hand pressed to his chest. He knew better than to act like this; he never liked losing control, especially not out in public. It wasn’t behavior befitting a prince of the house of Hou-Ting.

It wasn’t that Qi had done it. Or that Lin had done it, rather, seeing as Lin was the one doing the actual adopting, after all. He had always admired Qi for Qi’s ambition. And this? Coming into the marriage a Beifong? Oh, it was a masterstroke; a decisive and deadly move on the Pai Sho board, a gambit worthy of a Hou-Ting. The sheer audacity of it thrilled him, stirred his long latent predatory instincts, dulled by years of Republic City tea parties and lukewarm politics.

If Qi had told him ahead of time it would have lessened Qi’s advantage. How could he be angry about that? Wouldn’t he have done the same? He ran the water into the sink until it had cooled and then scooped up some in his hands, carefully bringing it to his face, making sure he didn’t spill onto the silk of his shirt. He let it calm his flushed cheeks before lowering his hands and letting the water flow back down the drain. He gently patted his face and scrutinized himself in the mirror. He was going to be twenty-nine this coming autumn; an age that for a time he thought he’d never attain. Kidnappings, assassins, the angry shouts of the mob, so many people who didn’t know him, had never met him, but nevertheless wished him dead.

He was alive, though. He was alive and he was a Hou-Ting, by damn. He was never going to be handsome; oh, he’d known it for years, he wasn’t in denial about it. Once upon a time it had hurt him but it didn’t hurt him any longer. Especially not since he’d married Mako. Mako was the love of his life, yes, and more than handsome enough for the both of them. He had his beautiful children, a house that he’d made a real home, a place that he’d finally felt was utterly his. He’d filled it with people who mattered to him, people he loved. He had his charity work and it had never been impersonal to him. The street children had opened his heart, had changed his life irrevocably, and he had no regrets.

But Qi, oh, his Qi, walking into Izumi’s ballroom, dressed in red, flirting above that gold fan, fueling speculation, flaunting Qi’s chimerical nature, inviting the crowd to look, to theorize, but never to touch. They had followed Qi, all of those Fire Nation nobles, like a moth to a dark flame. Something had changed that day; Qi’s old chains - poverty, want, neglect, fear - had dissolved behind the Hou-Ting badge Qi had so carefully pinned on.

Mako’s eyes had never left Qi; tracking Qi’s elusive shimmer throughout the evening, stalking Qi with feline grace, hissing his furious, bewildered arousal. He’d baited Mako that night after Qi had gone to bed until he snapped; taking him hard and fast, pouring all of that frustration into him, his strong, scarred hand pressed against his mouth so his cries wouldn’t wake the children just across the hall. He’d tried to apologize the next morning but he’d shushed him with his own fingers against his mouth. He didn’t want apologies for something he’d enjoyed so much.

Mako had been so confused by the Snazzy magazine photographs; unable to conflate the teenage driver who hid behind a uniform with this wondrous being of lipstick, silk and kohl. Mako loathed change; his mistake was thinking that Qi had changed, however. Qi hadn’t changed, not really. Qi had just taken off the mask, had stepped into the light, ready to dazzle. Qi was who Qi had always been. He understood this, deep into his bones. This was the Qi he’d fallen for when he’d been allowed little glimpses, here and there. The Qi that would kiss him breathless in the moonlight, who’d trap him between Qi’s legs, tease him until he was so hard he thought he’d scream with it. It had thrown him, yes. He’d been so surprised by the unmasking that even though he had suspected what was under it it had still caught him unawares.

Just like that damnable Beifong badge. He started to laugh, softly, watching his reflection in the mirror. Oh, so Qi wanted to dance? Well. Dance they would, then.

He patted his hair into place, unnecessarily smoothed his neat cravat, gave his face a cursory look to make sure he was presentable, took a deep breath, and walked back to the conference room.


	8. Chapter 8

He held my hand all the way back to the house, chattering about the book. Apparently he’s not been happy about the artist doing the covers; he’d like Huan to do them but is afraid it would lead to people guessing who he is. He’s probably right on that one. I told him that Set’s current girlfriend was an artist and a pretty good one at that. She might do for him.

I’d promised him an evening bath. I’d had them install a big copper soaking tub in the bathroom I’d had renovated into the bedroom I’d claimed for my own. He’s not the only one who likes to lie around in the water, after all. The day had been warm, but the night was going to cool down some, spring being what it was, so I started a fire as well. Mako would have come in handy right about then!

While I busied myself with the fire Wu started filling up the tub; he’d taken one look at the champagne bottle I’d brought upstairs and immediately popped it open, laughing because all I had was teacups.

“I suppose it doesn’t matter, does it?” he said, and took a dainty little sip, pinkie out, clearly amusing himself. He took the bottle with him into the bathroom, I’ll note.

The farmer’s wife down the way had agreed, for a certain sum of yuan a month, to come and air out the place, put fresh sheets on the bed, that sort of thing, if I sent her a letter telling her when. She’d done exactly as I’d asked, too, and had even left a vase full of lilies of the valley sitting on the night table. The whole room smelled of them and the cedar the carpenter had used to make the new bed. As I was building the fire up a little flicker in the corner of my eye turned out to be Marezelle, shyly peeping around the corner. I nodded at her and told her hello as she floated towards the bathroom door, listening.

“Is that the man?” she asked in that pretty voice of hers. She doesn’t speak all that much but when she does it sounds like she’s singing. Not like Wu’s singing, mind you. I nodded.

“That’s Wu,” I told her. “You can say hello if you want.”

“Maybe later,” she said, and drifted to sniff at the flowers. “The farm woman brought them.”

“I asked her to get things ready for us. She didn’t bother you, did she?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Good.”

“Storm is coming.” She pointed a pale purple paw towards the window.

“Really? Oh, I’d best move the car, then. Thanks for letting me know.”

“Yes, Qi,” she said, and sank down through the floor.

“Wu,” I called through the door. “There’s a storm on the way. I’m going to run out and move the car into the stables. I’ll be right back.”

“A storm? How do you know?”

“Marezelle told me.”

“Hmph,” he grunted, and I grinned as I jogged out the door. The stables were clean and had a new roof, but that was as far as I’d gotten with them. The car would be fine inside, if a little musty. I kicked off my boots and stopped by the kitchen on the way back in; Wu may live off of a dumpling a day but some of us need a little more fuel than that. There was a komodo sausage bun with my name on it.

“I’m back,” I said when I came into the bedroom but Wu didn’t answer. I figured he might not have heard me; my voice is a lot better than it was but I still can’t get much volume with it. I stuffed the last of the bun into my mouth and rapped on the door of the bathroom, quickly swallowing. “Wu? I’m back.”

No answer. I frowned. “Wu? You okay in there?” Nothing. I banged a little harder. “Hey, you in there?” I glanced around the bedroom to see if he’d gotten dressed or something but saw no sign of him. “Wu!” I tried the door and it was unlocked, so I opened it a crack. “You okay?” I opened it further and took a step in, looking towards the tub. He was in there with his back towards me; hair wrapped up in a towel, teacup discarded to the side, champagne bottle dangling from his fingers. “Wu?”

“Shut the door behind you, you’re letting in a draft,” he replied, not turning around. “So. Are you joining me in the bath or not?”


	9. Chapter 9

“Please accept my apologies for my behavior,” he said as he entered, bowing slightly before taking his seat. Sotaro nodded at him before passing him over a copy of the draft. “And I beg your pardon, Gun,” he said, turning to him. “It was poorly done of me. Of course I know how much you love the children.”

“Your Highness, you need never beg my pardon!” Gun fussily smoothed down his cuffs. He smiled at him.

“Yes I do. You raised me better than to speak to my honored elders in that way.”

Gun’s eyes filled with tears. “I did do my very best, Your Grace.”

Wu pressed a handkerchief into his hand before leaning forward to kiss his cheek. “I am so very grateful for all you did and continue to do for me.”

Gun sniffled loudly into the hankie. Everyone in the room politely pretended they did not notice; Lady Chun gave him a very warm and approving look, however.

Sotaro sent his secretary out to fetch a weighty tome that covered Ba Sing Se law; he also called in his colleague, Shao, who had more recent experience in drawing up a marriage contract between a member of the Fire Nation nobility and a Republic City citizen. It was Bong’s secretary, however, who remembered reading about adoption and citizenship; apparently due to the adoption Qi was now a citizen of Zaofu as well as the nation of Ba Sing Se, and that required another book about Zaofu law as well.

Finally Sotaro’s secretary politely pointed out the hour; Wu was startled to realize that they’d worked right past closing time. He wasn’t worried for himself, but felt guilty making such a long day for Gun. The secretary called a cab and he and Lady Chun both took an elbow and guided him out. “Are you sure you wouldn’t like to come back to the house?” he asked, handing him carefully into the taxi.

“If it is all the same to Your Highness, I would really like to go back to the quiet of my room there,” Gun replied.

 “Yes, of course, whatever you prefer. At least let me see you to your room,” Wu replied. When Gun tried to demur he overrode him, escorting him through the lobby and into the elevator, Lady Chun close behind. They took him to his suite and said their good nights before Wu flagged down the head concierge. “Please see to it that he has whatever he needs, Cam,” he said, and the man promised he would.

He gave the cab driver his address and then sat back with Lady Chun, who took his hand in hers. “Well, that was quite the day, wasn’t it?”

“I didn’t have nearly enough tea for it.”

She laughed, and patted him. “Neither did I, my dear. Neither did I.” They rode for a time in silence, the downtown streets curving away from the spirit portal and then back in towards the northern bridge. She squeezed his hand. “You aren’t angry with Qi, are you?”

Wu sighed. “No. Well, that’s not entirely true.” He turned his head away from the window to meet her gaze. “I’m hurt that neither Qi nor Lin said anything. And who else knows? Does LoLo know? Mako can’t possibly, he would have said something.”

She chaffed his hands gently between hers. “Dearest, I know the timing is what it is. But do you really think Qi did this just to spite you? Or to gain an advantage in the contract?” She smoothed back an errant curl that had been trying to escape all day. “You know that isn’t true. Qi has been trying to find who Qi is for years now.”

“I know,” he replied, and sighed again.

She gazed at him for a long moment before smiling. “Your mother was a very quick person. I don’t mean how she moved, she was slender like you are but she was raised a nobleman’s daughter in the old Earth Kingdom, we were taught to be gracious and flowing, like silk and water.” The curl was patted into place again. “What I mean is that like you she was impulsive; quick to laugh, quick to anger, and just as quick to forgive. She could never stay angry at anyone for very long. It was one of the things I loved the most about her.”

“Oh, Chun.” He’d known, for years now, that his mother and the Lady Chun had been lovers until his mother had been shipped off to the Royal Palace to marry his father.

She leaned forward to kiss him on his cheek, her eyes a bit wet. “You are so like your mother that way. Impulsive, but so very generous and forgiving. Be generous and forgiving with Qi, my sweet boy. Qi loves you so much and just wants to be worthy of you.” She drew his head down to rest on her shoulder and he closed his eyes, breathing her in, this woman who should have been his other mother.


	10. Chapter 10

“You want me to get in the bath with you.” I watched him take another drink of the champagne. For a man that likes to pat himself on the back about his good manners, I don’t think swilling down half of it from the bottle itself was exactly what his hoard of tutors had in mind.

“You will do as you please, of course,” he said in that condescending voice that always makes Mako want to pick him up and shake him. Me, I just think it’s pretty funny. Of course I’m going to do what I please, I don’t need him to proclaim it with a royal decree or something. But it wasn’t that. He was trying to play chicken with me. I know him better than he thinks I do.

Also? I don’t play chicken. I don’t want to go on about it, but after you’ve killed a man there’s not a whole lot a buck naked half drunk man in a tub can say or do to get you to do something you don’t want to. I killed my first man when I was nine. My give a fuck meter’s permanently broken. So without a word I started to undress. You want me in that tub? Well then get ready, Your Majesty, because here I come.

I didn’t make a big deal of it, just shucked my clothes off and hung them up over a chair. I don’t think he realized at first what I was doing but but me unbuckling my belt got the water in that tub sloshing a bit, let me tell you. When I’d finished I walked straight over there and hopped up and over the side, resting my back against the opposite end of the tub, facing him, sliding my legs on either side of his. I reached over and hooked the bottle out of his hand and took a drink. I’m not much of a drinker and champagne’s not my favorite, but I figured the occasion called for it.

He stared at me like one of his fish, mouth wide open. I’ve never seen him in anything less than a bathing suit and you can believe he covers up as much as possible. For that matter I don’t know that I’ve ever seen his bare feet, even on the beach he wears some sort of shoes and he pretty much never gets in the water. The man’s modest. I’d seen the edges of the scar I knew was on his left shoulder, but never the whole thing. I sure as shit had never seen the scar low down on his belly. I knew it was there, I knew he’d been stabbed. But I don’t know that any of us short of Mako had ever seen it. Ugly damn thing. I’m surprised he was still there to gape at me, that’s how bad it was. It required another slug of champagne, I can tell you that much.

“Oh! Well!” He was blinking at me, those green eyes all wide and startled and I grinned.

“Didn’t want me, shouldn’t have invited me. Or didn’t you think I would?”

He leaned forward and took the bottle out of my hand and took another long pull from it. He was something to see; the former King, sitting in a copper tub, his hair wrapped up so it wouldn’t frizz, drinking champagne from the bottle, trying not to be obvious that he was staring at me. Because I can guarantee you he hadn’t seen much of me, either. I’m not modest, not really; I’ve got no quibble with my body. But people see it and make automatic assumptions about it and me, and a person gets weary of constantly dealing with it.

“May I touch you?” he asked, hesitant in a way that I rarely hear.

“I’m here, you may as well,” I said, and kept still. He reached out a hand that was trembling just slightly and his fingers grazed my nipple before he snatched them back like they were going to shrivel up and fall off or something. I laughed; I couldn’t help it. “They ain’t gonna bite you, I reckon,” letting my old accent creep in, and that got me a little twinkle in return, which I was hoping for.

“I…well. Well. Gracious. I don’t think I’ve actually touched a breast since I was an infant. I certainly don’t remember ever doing so.” He put his hand to his mouth and giggled nervously.

“Well, I don’t have all that much. I’m no Nuo or anything.” I looked down. Just a little scoop each; I’ve always wondered if my mother was the same, but she had me at sixteen or thereabouts and died less than two years later, so who knows? She was just a baby herself.

“Oh thank goodness, I think Nuo’s significant endowments might be the end of me,” he replied, and there was that sparkle in his eye I loved to see.


	11. Chapter 11

Qi was sitting perched on one of the large stone dragons that guarded the stairs from the driveway to the veranda of the house when the cab dropped them off, hopping down to help the Lady out of the backseat.

Lady Chun patted Qi’s cheek fondly. “I’m going to go on inside. You children go take a walk and talk this out. I’ll let LoLo know not to hold dinner.”

They walked around the side of the house, past the long expanse of the eastern wing, opening up the small hidden gate used by the gardeners and slipping inside. Not before their nearest neighbor to that side, the ever meddlesome Madame Zong, spotted them, however. She stuck her heavily ornamented head out of her second floor window, peering down at them through a bejeweled lorgnette.

“Prince Hou-Ting! I see you there! Why are you sneaking about with the help! In my day princes didn’t go through the servants’ entrance!”

“I swear some day I’m going to stroll over there stark naked, ask her to invite me in for some tea. If we’re really lucky she’ll drop dead right there,” Qi muttered, kicking the gate shut with feeling and Wu started to laugh.

“Qi!”

“Nasty old bird. Poor Zhi’s terrified of her, she shouts at him every time he walks past, he’s taken to sprinting past her windows now.” Qi’s face wrinkled up and one finger waved in the air indignantly. “Prince Yaozhi! Does your father know you are running like that! In my day Crown Princes walked with some dignity!” Qi snorted. “She wouldn’t know a prince if one bit her on her flabby old ass. Like sticking her head out of her windows to spy on the neighbors is some sort of high and mighty behavior.”

He tucked his arm into Qi’s. “You’re terrible. I’m trying to teach the children to respect their elders, I hope you don’t talk about Madame Zong like this in front of them!”

Qi shot him a look. “You know I don’t.”

“Hmph.”

He walked them to the pavilion that looked out onto the koi pond, settling down on one of the benches, plumping up one of the pillows before he turned to raise an eyebrow at Qi.

Qi pulled the silver cigarette case out of Qi’s breast pocket. At Wu’s nod, Qi took out a lighter of malachite and silver, careful to light the cigarette and blow the first drag away from him. “Well, I guess you want to talk about this. What do you want to know?”

Wu spread out his hands. “All of it? I suppose you can start with whose idea was it and when you came up with it.”

Qi exhaled a jet of smoke and gazed out over the pond. “Lin approached me after Princess Juziya’s investiture. Wanted to know if I really knew what that Hou-Ting badge meant, what it would mean for me.” Qi’s gaze met Wu’s. “She spent a lot more time and went into a lot more detail about it than you ever did.”

He squirmed a little. “Well, I would have elaborated on the subject if you had asked.”

“That’s a shitty answer and you know it.” Qi blew out an angry, smoldering breath. “Anyway. We talked a lot about it, and when you asked me to marry you I was confused and angry and so I went to her and asked if I could stay at her flat. She said yes right away; in fact, came upstairs and helped me pack my things.” Qi’s smile was tender. “She does like to put up a big I don’t give a damn about anybody front, but she’s not fooling all of us. Not by a long shot.”

“Yes, I know.” He risked a little smile and got a nod in return.

“The day after I moved out she came over and talked to me. Told me that she’d been thinking it over for a long time. The fact that she didn’t have any kids, that the title was hers, that kind of thing. And that she wanted to ask me what I thought. Made it real clear that it was up to me and that she’d not be offended if I said no. Made sure I knew what it meant, too. I didn’t decide right away. I needed to think about it and talk more to her about it and we did that.”

Qi ground out the cigarette and placed the stump back in the case before looking back at Wu. “I know you know my background. I was on my own pretty much always. I don’t remember my Mama at all, and the other whores kept an eye out for me but didn’t raise me or anything. But I came here when I was just shy of turning fourteen and that woman started looking out for me.” Qi chuckled. “I don’t mean in the way that most mothers do. But she bought me my first knives and took me to Yumi, helped me buy clothes, that kind of thing. And when I started eating regular my bleeding started and I went to her, I was all in knots about it. I knew what it was, of course. It wasn’t that. I knew how to take care of myself too, learned that where I grew up. But she talked to me about it, comforted me, made me feel better.”

Wu’s cheeks started to heat up a bit. “I don’t suppose I ever thought of that sort of thing. With you, I mean.”

Qi snorted, head shaking in amusement. “No kidding.”


	12. Chapter 12

“I’m not really sure I know what all I am supposed to manage.” he said, and took another gulp of the champagne. “I’m not all that well versed with the-” here the bottle was waved in my general direction, even though he was keeping his eyes either firmly on my face or over my shoulder “-difference in anatomy, as it were.”

“People have been figuring it out since forever,” I replied, trying my best not to laugh at him. “I’m pretty sure you’d be up for the task.” He wasn’t up quite yet; too nervous. I needed to do something about that. “Besides, I got some great tips.”

He blinked. “I…oh. Gracious. Do you mean Mako?”

I did laugh then. “All Mako told me was not to break you or anything.”

“Well!” He sputtered and thrust the bottle in what I am guessing he thought was a menacing way. “I like that!” Another swallow. Good thing I didn’t want any of that champagne because I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to be getting any more of it. His eyes flew open. “Please tell me you didn’t discuss it with Lin!”

I shook my head. “Nope.” I raised my foot just a little and gently ran it down the side of his thigh under the water. He made this strange sort of all over quiver. “I got some advice from a book.”

“A book! You can’t possibly mean it!” He sat up and some of the bathwater sloshed over the side; he was too busy waving the bottle at me to notice. “What kind of book?” Now I had his attention. “My goodness. Was it some sort of instructional manual? Do they even have those?”

“Sure. With pictures, even.”

That got me one of his skeptical looks. “I don’t believe you. What kind of bookstore would carry that kind of book?”

I leaned forward, pressing in with my knees. “A bookstore in a neighborhood you aren’t allowed in.”

His eyes got big at that one. “Oh Qi,” he whispered, leaned close to me. “Won’t you take me to that neighborhood?”

I put my mouth up to his ear. “No.”

His breathing was coming faster now. “Why not?”

“Because they aren’t places for little princes.” I ran my tongue along his earlobe and he shuddered and dropped the champagne bottle into the water. It was as good as empty anyhow; I ignored it.

“Oh Qi,” he gasped out and I had been thinking that I’d try to take it slower, for both of our sakes, but that kind of undid me. I shifted and pressed myself into him, skin on skin, first time I’d ever done it. With anyone. I was going to go for his ear again but he surprised me by grabbing at my head and pulling me closer to kiss his mouth.

I’ve got no real experience. Not because I didn’t want it because I wanted it. Bad. But because I only wanted it with him and I’d told myself for years it wasn’t going to happen. I came so close to leaving, so many times, just packed up my things and moved on, that’s how bad it was for me. I never meant to tangle Mako up in it but it’s hard not to get caught up with the two of them, they’re so close. I know Wu meant it when he told me Mako would make my first time good, Mako’s Mako, he doesn’t do anything unless he does it right. But it needed to be Wu. I needed it to be. I think he needed it as well.

I know I was just a dumb fourteen year old with a crush on the glamorous prince who had held out his hand and offered me the world. I get it. That’s not what it is now, though, and it hasn’t been for years. He’s a man, flaws and all and we’re both adults and I’ll marry him on my own terms or I won’t marry him at all.

He, on the other hand, knew his way around a kiss so I was happy to let him do that, especially as he brought his hands around my waist. He was getting hard under me and I so gave a little experimental wiggle and was rewarded with an immediate result when he dug his fingers into me a little deeper. “I don’t want to do this here,” I said, moving my head away a little.

He wasn’t having any of that, though, and guided me right back in. “Why not?”

“This water’s getting cold and you look ridiculous with that towel on your head.”

“Qi!” He pulled back to give me one of his pissy royal glares, but I just laughed.

“Come on, at least take me to the bed.” I easily launched myself away from him and out of the tub, landing lightly on my toes. I hooked a towel and wrapped it around myself. “Be a good boy.”


	13. Chapter 13

Qi looked back over the pond. “We didn’t just talk the once. It was one of those conversations that go on over time and different places.” Qi brushed away some imaginary dirt off of Qi’s trousers. “The thing is, Wu, is that you were a motherless child, yeah, but you weren’t nameless. You knew who you were. Even Mako knew who he was, he had parents and a home before he lost them. He always had his brother, and later on his Dad’s family. But me?” Qi met his gaze again. “I had nothing. No name, no idea who my father was, I don’t know much about my mother beyond the fact that she was young and was already pregnant when she got there.” Qi’s smile was bitter. “Some men like that kind of thing.”

“Oh, Qi.”

Qi waved him off. “It was a long time ago. She’s at peace now, and I’m glad. But you have to understand something, Wu.” Qi gazed at him for a long moment before speaking again. “Finding myself was never some sort of throwaway thing for me. I spent so many years running, hiding, just trying to survive. I had no idea who I was. All the things that most people know I didn’t know about myself. Like, what’s your favorite food? Or your favorite book? What do you enjoy doing for fun? I was too busy staying alive to find out any of those things.”

“I don’t suppose I ever thought of any of that, either,” he said slowly. He could feel the heat creeping up his neck.

“No, you didn’t. I’m not judging you, mind. I know your experience of life was different than mine. But slowly, as time went on here, I started to figure some of those things out. Lin and LoLo were a big part of that for me. LoLo took care of me, fed me up slowly, helped me to start feeling comfortable in the house. Who do you think was teaching me table manners? Or how to tie a cravat? It was LoLo, that’s who, and he did it in his own way, you know how he is. He never made me feel bad or stupid about it, he’d just joke and talk and put me at my ease.” Qi’s smile was softer, now. “And Lin, she gave me the means to learn how to protect myself. Not the way a scared little kid would do it, but as an adult, in control. I can’t tell you what that meant to me.”

“She has always kept an eye out, I did notice that.” Wu loosened his own cravat just a little.

“More than an eye. She talked to me, encouraged me, kept me walking the straight and narrow. Not in the way your Lady Chun would do it, she’s not exactly the cuddly type.”

He laughed. “I should say not!”

Qi flashed a grin. “Just as well, I don’t know how well I would have done with someone like your Lady Chun. Having Lin knock sense into my head in her own way was better for me, anyhow.” Qi stood up and leaned over the edge of the railing, squinting into the pond again. “I think one of your pipes is clogged over here. We can ask the baby to unclog it when Korra comes for dinner this week, it’d be good practice for her so long as Korra minds that she doesn’t drown anyone.”  Qi looked back at Wu. “But this whole Beifong thing was her way of offering me a chance to find myself before I tied myself into becoming a Hou-Ting, do you understand? It was a way of me defining who I am, who I want the world to see.”

“But you’re Qi. I don’t understand why you need to be a Beifong, of all things, on top of that.” He was aware that it sounded petulant the moment it came out of his mouth. Qi just shot him a look.

“We’re going to pretend you didn’t just say that to me.” Qi perched on the railing. “Listen. Mako, he’s never given a damn about your royal status or politics or anything like that. It’s not who he is. Lin used to talk about him taking over her old job but it’ll never happen. He’s a good detective but he’d crash and burn when it came to the political side of being the chief of police. It’s just that Lin loves him and she always has a more than a bit of a blind spot when it comes to the people she loves.”

“Oh.” Wu had never thought of it that way. Qi was right, however; Lin did have tunnel vision when it came to the people she truly cared about.

“Yeah, well. In any case. But me? I have an eye for that kind of thing. The politics, I mean. It’s something new I discovered about myself. I’m no diplomat - that’s your thing, not mine - but I’m good at observing and seeing which way the wind is blowing. And that did come from my past. Your dinner parties? They’re all a game. Which pieces are being moved across the board? Who’s aligned with whom? How to influence things without anybody noticing. I’m good at that, Wu. But I can’t do it when I’m your trumped up scruffy little driver off the streets.” Qi leaned closer. “Do you follow me, here? I needed to dress and act the part. No more accent, no more keeping to the shadows. But the fact remained that I still had no name behind me. It matters. You know it does.”


	14. Chapter 14

He scrambled out of the tub after me, not quite as nimble, grabbing at a towel and quickly drying himself off. Left the bottle in the tub and didn’t even bother with the drain, but that’s Wu for you. I figured I’d deal with it later and let my own towel drop to the floor. I went to go and check the fire, add a couple of logs to it, bank it for the night. There’s still a nip in the air at nights and Wu gets cold pretty easily. The high ceilings here are beautiful but they mean it’s a bitch to keep warm. I’m guessing they didn’t do much hunting in the winter, though.

By the time I’d finished fussing with the fire he’d crept into the bed and was laying there with the covers pulled up to his shoulders, the firelight flashing off the lenses of his glasses. If he was hoping that the towel was going to keep his hair from frizzing then he was going to be sorely disappointed. He looked so much like prissy Madame Zong from next door that it took everything in me to keep from laughing. I’ve read the man’s novels and let’s just say that he’s got a pretty vivid imagination for a fellow that looked like he wanted to sink into the bed. He was thinking too much; he always does this.

I hopped up on the bed and straddled him over the covers. His eyes nearly popped out of his head. “Qi!” he said in that scandalized tone he does like no one else and I grinned down at him.

“I’ve got an idea. Want to play a game?”

His eyes narrowed and his mouth twitched a little. Wu’s intensely competitive. The only thing he loves more than playing games is winning them. He’s a terrible winner, too, he loves to gloat and strut around the house when he does. “A game?”

“Sure. We can dice a little. The first to roll lays the terms of the bet.”

Now his eyes lit up. “I see. Hmmm. Well. I suppose we could try it.” He was practically salivating. The fact that I know how to cheat my ass off playing dice never seemed to occur to him. It wouldn’t. I hopped off of him and opened up a drawer in the desk in the bedroom, pulling out a pair of dice, motioning him to get out of the bed.

“We need to play on a hard surface. Come on, I’ll tell you the rules, you can go first.” I laid it down for him as he came and crouched down next to me. I think he would have been thinking more of the fact that we were naked as the day we were born if he hadn’t been so intent on figuring out how he could possibly win.

I ain’t stupid, you know.

He took the die from my hand and, like I had told him, rolled them up against the bedroom wall. A seven. His face lit up. “Oh! Oh, a seven. Ah, that’s a pass, yes? So I win.” He clapped his hands together once. “Per our bet the loser has to kiss the other one on the mouth.” A toss of those frizzy-ass curls. “Well. You’ve been eliminated, Qi. Pay your forfeit.”

I leaned forward and kissed him. A hot one, too. I added some tongue for good measure because I’m not one of the fluttery blushing virgins he likes to write about in his books. When I pulled away we were both a little flushed, though. I took the loaded dice from his hand where he was still clutching them and pretended to think for a moment. “Loser has to kiss a nipple.” He pinked up a little at that and I raised an eyebrow. “Too rich for you? You in or out?”

Up went that chin in that hoity-toity way of his. “I am in, naturally.”

“All right, then.” I threw. A seven, of course, that’s what this pair is meant to do. Of course on the street I’d swap them in and out for ones that were loaded to roll other numbers or even the ones I have that are straight, but I was hoping we’d not get that far. I could manage it without a stitch on but it’s easier with sleeves, that’s for damn sure.

“I lost,” he said, in a tiny little voice. He was staring at my breasts.

“Pay up, then.” My stomach was all in knots, mind. But I wasn’t about to let it show. He scooted himself a little closer to me and I couldn’t stop myself from staring at his chest. He’s got more hair there than I suspected, a shade darker than on his head, curling a little. It looked soft. I wanted to touch it but I didn’t want to scare him off, so I sat as still as I could while he leaned in and took a nipple in his mouth. I started to shake just a little; I wasn’t trying to do it, it was just happening. After a moment he started to suckle gently and my trembling kicked up a notch. He wasn’t trembling though; he reached up one hand to hold me steady and put the other to my other breast, his fingers tugging at it lightly. My breath caught in my throat; I’ve done it to myself but it never made me feel like this, like I was all over heat and my heart started pounding, hard. I didn’t make a sound until he bit down on it; then I couldn’t stop myself from making a whimpering noise and he grinned around my nipple, triumphant.


	15. Chapter 15

He stared at Qi. How could he argue that a family name didn’t matter? He of all people knew that it did. He’d been raised to believe that names and the families behind them were the only thing that mattered. He hadn’t known that it meant that much to Qi, however, and realizing it made him uncomfortable enough to shift a bit, dropping his eyes to the side.

“Coming into the marriage a Beifong means I’m someone, Wu.”

He took a deep breath and nodded, raising his eyes to meet Qi’s. “I understand. I have…well. I have many feelings about all of this, but I suppose that’s for me to handle on my own. But I do understand.” He cocked his head and thought for a moment. “What did Su think of all this?”

Qi smiled. “Lin brought it up to her on one of her visits. She didn’t say anything until I had agreed, she didn’t want to open up that can of beetleworms for no cause. According to Lin the moment she told her Su jumped in, started trying to take the whole thing over.”

“That sounds about right,” he said, laughing. “She does frequently commandeer things.”

Qi’s eyes rolled. “Yeah, well, I left that between the two of them. I’m not about to get in the middle of it. I did send a letter to her son, though. Sent it back with Huan after we all spent the New Year together. I wanted to make sure he knew about it, that he got to have his say. That was the hold up, by the way. The mail doesn’t exactly work up there the way it does down here. It took awhile to get an answer.”

Wu was surprised by this. “You wrote to Baatar Junior?”

Qi nodded. “I did. Told him who I was, what we were doing, and why, asked him what he thought of it. The title was going to be his, after all. It was only fair.”

“My gracious, Qi! What on earth did he say?”

Qi chuckled a little. “Told me in no uncertain terms I was welcome to it, that he didn’t want it. Never had.” Qi held up a hand. “I don’t mean he was rude or anything, just that he made it clear. Reminded me a little of Mako, actually. Strange but true. Got me to wondering if that’s why Bolin has always stuck by him, even after everything that happened.” Qi shrugged. “Well, neither here nor there. When I got the letter from him I told Lin we could go ahead and she contacted her sister and they started the paperwork down there.”

They sat for time in silence, Qi staring out at the pond, Wu staring down at his hands. “And now you are a Beifong.”

“And now I’m a Beifong.”

“I have to say, this did surprise me. I suppose I expected you to actually negotiate the marriage contract, you being you, but I didn’t quite have this in mind!”

Qi stretched, a lithe movement that involved an interplay of lean muscle. “Well, like I said, this was about me and not you.” Qi raised an eyebrow in an imitation of his own look. “So we’re clear on this, yeah?”

“We are, indeed, clear on this.” His smile was slow. “Qi Beifong.”

“Heh,” was the only response, but it came with a crooked little smirk. “I’ve got my badge. Comes with the hereditary chop, too, but Lin’s got it stuffed in a box in her room, she never uses it. Big old heavy thing made of of jade and gold. Her mother left it for her when she left Republic City but she never even took it out to look at it until she took it out to show me.”

“The seal? She has the Beifong seal?” Wu put a hand to his chest. “I suppose I always assumed Su had it, I don’t know why. Lin’s never said anything!”

“They really did not part on good terms, Lin and her Mama.” Qi whistled. “That’s for damn sure.”

“You don’t mean you’ve talked about it!” Wu leaned forward, ears practically quivering. “She never discusses it!”

“Yeah well, if she wanted to talk about it with you she would, so simmer down over there. I’m not going to tell you what she told me in confidence. And don’t make that pouty face at me either.”


	16. Chapter 16

He pulled away from me, biting down on his lip, his eyes all big and soft. If this was his version of a bedroom look then I can tell you, it was working for me. He held his hand out. “My turn.” I handed the dice over and he looked at them before smirking back at me. “Winner gets to kiss wherever they like.”

I nodded. “Roll it, then.” I knew he was going to roll a seven. I just wondered where it was he wanted to kiss.

He tossed them against the wall and as they tumbled to a stop he raised his eyebrow and looked at me. “I am no expert on the vagaries and statistics of thrown dice, but I believe yours may be defective.”

“You don’t say.”

He ran a warm hand up the inside of my calf, gently pushing my legs open before cupping my knee and bringing his mouth to it. “In fact, one might even think you were engaging in unsportsmanlike behavior.” He kissed his slow way up my thigh. “Tell me, Qi,” another kiss, this one getting awful close to parts so far unknown, “what exactly do they do to swindlers where you come from?” He was so close now that his nose was bumping into me and it was taking everything in me not move my hips so I could give him a little nudge in there, as it were.

“They beat the shit out of them, most times,” I managed, my voice all tight and hoarse, like it used to be.

He smiled up at me, a deadly smile, wicked in a way I’d never seen before. “Later,” he promised, and that was it, all those hot and prickly feelings got even hotter and pricklier and my hips did move at that point and he kissed me, right there, did some little nibbley thing that made me cry out and grab at his head. He liked it, too, damn him, he looked up at me and grinned. “You know, I think I may be beginning to comprehend the appeal of all this,” he said, and dove back in.

It’s not that I’ve never made myself come; I have and I like it. I like that blazing feeling that rushes through me, how my body can be tight and loose all at the same time, how my nipples beg to be touched, how my toes point and my stomach tenses and my chest and neck and cheeks go a blotchy red. He wasn’t doing it exactly the way I liked it; I like to use my thumb, in hard circles, and he was using his tongue, soft and lapping, but it was working for me, it was making me push into him and make these little whining noises I couldn’t control. I knew he had no experience with it but I should have realized that a man who spends his free time writing dirty books had to have researched the subject pretty well and he’s always been a quick learner. I braced myself with my hands so as not to fall backwards onto the hard stone floor and I was just starting to think that I wasn’t going to be able to keep myself upright for much longer when he pulled away, the lower part of his nose, lips and chin wet. _That_ _’s me,_ I thought, and it made a spasm go right through me.

“Oh, Qi,” he breathed, his chest rising and falling, “Oh, Qi, I think maybe we should take this up to the bed.” He was a little shaky, though, and so I steadied him with a hand and then he kissed me, and I tasted myself on him and I wanted more, so I yanked my hands up off the floor to pull him closer to me and we both overbalanced and fell backwards, my elbow hitting the flagstones with a sharp crack that brought tears to my eyes. “Oh, did you hurt yourself?” he asked, breaking the kiss, and with a grunt I came to my feet, grabbing him and pulling him upwards with me.

“Bed,” I told him, and he came willingly, the two of us tangled together, landing in a heap of legs and arms and I reached down to figure out what was jabbing me in the hip and it was him, and when my hand closed around it he groaned and closed his eyes. We were half on the bed and half off it and I dragged him all the way up while still trying to kiss him. I didn’t want to stop touching him.


	17. Chapter 17

 

“You’re a terrible gossip,” Wu said, crossing his arms over his chest. “And by that I of course mean that you won’t gossip at all.”

Qi just grinned at him. “I leave that to you and your committee friends.”

He sighed, a long suffering sound. “We do more than sit around and drink tea and gossip, you know.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Qi!” He pulled a face and Qi laughed, unconcerned. Qi was sitting the way Qi always liked to sit; perched on something, ready to move at a moment’s notice, body long and lean. Qi’s hair had grown a little; it was still combed back but it was looser now, softening the harsh angles of Qi’s face somewhat. The cosmetics were something Qi was playing around with now, sometimes lipstick or kohl around the eyes, sometimes nothing at all. As far as he could tell it all had to do with Qi’s mood or where Qi was going.

“What?” Qi cocked Qi’s head at him.

He gazed a Qi for long moment while his smile made a slow return. “I was just looking at you, that’s all. You’ve changed a lot in the past nine years.”

“Speak for yourself.” Qi gazed right back. “You aren’t the same either.”

“I suppose I’m not, at that.” They sat there for a time, watching each other, the setting sun behind bringing up the highlights in Qi’s hair. “Your hair is darker, for one thing. Darker than it used to be, I mean.”

Qi shrugged. “Don’t know what to tell you. It’s done it on its own. That at least I had nothing to do with.” A sly grin. “Course, you’re going to be thirty in another year. Guess we need to start thinking about what we’re going to do about those gray hairs.”

His hands flew up to his head. “Where? I check my head with excruciating thoroughness each and every morning to…” He trailed off and scowled. “Now you’re teasing me.”

“You vain old thing. Besides, I bet you’ll look good with gray hair.”

Wu patted his hair to make sure he hadn’t disturbed it. “You do?”

Qi slid off the railing to sit down next to him, nudging at him with Qi’s shoulder. “I do. I look forward to seeing what you are going to look like as an old man. Dapper, I expect.”

“Hmph,” he replied, but he was pleased. “I’ll never look as good as Mako, though.”

Qi snorted at that, a distinctly Beifong sound. “None of us will.”

Wu slid his fingers into Qi’s warm, dry hand. It was callused, that hand; used to work, not at all pampered although he knew that Qi applied a thick cream to keep the skin from cracking or snagging on Qi’s embroidery silks. But that was Qi for you; a person who cared for their body without coddling it. Qi was never going to be a coddler, never going to recline in the lap of luxury the way he loved to do. Qi was never going to be someone that Qi wasn’t, not for anyone or anything. It was one of the things that he had always admired the most about Qi.

“What’s the smile for?” Qi reached over and tapped a finger on the end of his nose.

“I was just thinking that if there was any family you’d fit well with, it was the Beifongs. They don’t follow anyone’s rules.”

Qi chuckled, squeezing at his hand. “Su told me the same. Said that her mother would have thought it a hilarious joke to have some street kid who can’t make up their mind if they are a boy or a girl take on the part of the head of the family.”

“She really said that?”

Qi shook Qi’s head, still laughing. “Yeah, she did. Her son said something similar in his letter, told me that he hoped his great-grandfather was rolling in his noble grave because he knew his grandmother would’ve thought it was the best thing ever.” A quick glance at Wu. “I don’t think the man has a lot of respect for the whole inherited class system thing.”

“I think that’s a given, based on his past.” Wu put his head on Qi’s shoulder. “You’re not going to go easy on me during these marriage negotiations, are you?”

“Not on your life. That lawyer is Su Beifong’s personal lawyer. She’s a sandshark. As Su said to me, I'm a Beifong now and Beifongs don’t let anyone get the best of them.” Qi kissed the top of his head. “You’ll survive it.”

“I don’t suppose you’re going to call Lin _mother_ now, hmm?”

Qi obviously found this funny, creaking out Qi’s rusty chuckle. “She’d knock my ass into next week if I even tried. Although Su told me she wanted me to call her aunt. Half because she’s pretty damn keen at the idea of being an aunt and half because she knows it will piss Lin off to no end, I think.”

“I think you’re correct in that supposition.” They were quiet for a time, looking out over the pond. The sun was sliding closer and closer to the horizon; soon they’d need a lantern if they didn’t want to stumble down the path. A wood frog started to serenade them, hoping to find a mate. “Does LoLo know?”

“Lin told him when it went through, yeah. Not before that. He just laughed at it, you know how he is. Made a great deep bow at me while Lin told him to knock it off.” Qi smiled at the memory. “Su talked to Baatar about it and I’m assuming Baatar Junior probably told Huan, but no one’s said anything to Opal or the twins yet.” Another squeeze of Wu’s hands. “I’m hoping that Wei will be okay with it.” For the first time, he detected a bit of hesitance. “I’m hoping he will be. But I don’t know. Don’t know how Mako is going to react either, but I’m hoping he’s okay with it.”

Wu pursed up his lips a little. “I can’t say for certain, naturally, but I shouldn’t think Mako would be upset. Certainly he wouldn’t want Lin to adopt him, if that’s what you are concerned with.”

“You don’t think so?”

“No. He has a family and he loves them very much. I know he looks at Lin as a maternal figure, but he remembers his own parents very well and has certain feelings about trying to replace them. It’s why he and Bolin ran away from the orphanage, you know.”

“Yeah, he told me about that once. He was smart to do it. Most of those people adopting from the orphanages are looking for kids they can use for free labor. It’s why most of us on the street avoided them like anything.” Qi sighed and dropped another kiss on the top of his head. “Well, I reckon we should go on inside before it gets any darker. Otherwise with my luck you’d end up in the pond.”

“Qi!”

Qi just laughed, however, before standing up and pulling him along. “Ah, you know Mako will turn on the outdoor lights.” At that moment the electric lamps about the gardens flashed on; winked off and then came back on again to burn steadily. “Well, there you go. I swear sometimes that man can read minds. Now he’s telling us to come on in. Probably going to scowl at me and let me have it for keeping you from your dinner.” Qi didn’t look worried, however; merely tucked Wu’s arm into Qi’s own and started to walk back to the house.


	18. Chapter 18

“Wait,” he said, actually putting his fingers over my mouth, like that was going to do something to stop me.

“What now?” I swear I wasn’t trying to get pissy with him but my patience was running a mite bit thin by this point. I think I must have been glaring because he squeaked a little bit.

“It’s just I’ve never had to worry about the um…well. You know.”

“Spit it out, Wu.”

His face started to take on color, and he leaned forward to whisper in my ear, because I guess someone else was going to hear us? “The er…ah…you know. Uh…”

It clicked. “You mean contraceptives? Since when do you take me for a fool? I worked that all out with Kya months ago.”

He leaned back to blink at me. “Did you! Well. I see.”

Give the man a chance and he’d chitchat all night. “Good. You’ve seen. Three cheers for you. Now if you don’t mind, I’ve been biding my time very nicely here and either you’re going to do something about it or I swear I’ll get back in that car and drive back home and give Mako a crack at it.”

That put a burr up his ass, just like I knew it would. “I beg your pardon! I don’t-”

I cut him off with a kiss and grabbed his prick while I was at it, for good measure. I figured that would shut him up and I was not wrong about that. Any little drooping it might have done perked right on back up. Fuck knows I love him but I have never met in my life anyone who could flap his jaw like he does. If I let him have his way we’d be going round in circles for hours and if I’m being honest here I might’ve lost my nerve altogether. Sorry to say it, but I was kind of wishing for Mako at that point; he would have taken charge and ordered everyone around plus the man had experience with the kind of body I was offering, which never hurts either. But I didn’t, so I could either work it on my own or go find another bed to sleep in.

He was still nervous, though. “Qi, I’m afraid I won’t do things the right way, and…oh gracious, you’re making it difficult for me to concentrate when you do that…”

I took his face into my two hands. “Wu. People been doing this as long as there’ve been people. I don’t have any expectations. I chose you. I knew what it meant. Can’t you just be here with me and not worry that I’m holding you up to some standard? There’s nobody here but us, but only if you leave everybody else behind.” I kissed him. “I don’t want the King of the Earth Kingdom. I don’t want the Prince of Republic City. I never did. I just want you.”

He smiled at me then, that real smile of his, the one he saves for the people he loves, the one that always has made my heart fall all over itself with wanting. For once I’d said the right thing.

His brown skin was so smooth and his chest hair was as soft as I’d hoped. I ran my hands over him everywhere and he made little gasping noises, his body shaking under me. I smelled the jasmine and the smell of the sweat that rose up on him, tasted salt and musk. I followed the trail that started on his belly, through the barren slash of his scar, down to his dark nest of hair. His prick jerked in my hand as I held it, and without thinking I licked at the head of it where it was dark and wet and gleaming. He cried out, then, and I took it in my mouth. It felt alive and hot and I swear to you I could feel his heartbeat through it, fast and hard. He had his fingers in my hair and as I slid my mouth up and down he tightened his fingers and moaned and I felt like I owned the fucking world. I cupped his balls in one hand and gave them a little tug and he started thrashing about on the bed, begging me to take more of him in my mouth.

I loved it, I did. I loved the noise he was making, the way he was begging me, how I could tell he was moving without meaning to. On impulse I let his prick go and took his balls into my mouth and he whined, body arching up. I started to move them around a little but he banged on my head and said, “Don’t, don’t, I won’t last,” and so I let them go (with some regret, if I am being honest here) and let him pull me up his body until we were face to face.

“May I touch you?” he asked, swallowing hard, his hand extended, ever the gentleman.

“Do whatever the fuck you want, if I don’t like it I’ll tell you,” I said, and that was all he needed to hear. His hands were all over me then, hands first feeling and then tugging at my nipples, which made me move across the bed, I could feel the wet coming out of me. His fingers rippled over the muscles in my stomach and curved around what hips I have, stroking and stroking. I didn’t know I could feel like that, tense with wanting him to do more to me but at the same time, so warm and good. One hand slid down my thigh and he took in a quick breath.

“So wet,” he said, like it was the most amazing thing he’d ever discovered. He put his fingers to his mouth and licked them and that was it, I grabbed at his hand and put it back there. His fingers found my clit and he started to to move them but I stopped him.

“Like this,” I said, all breathless, my voice hardly making any noise, and I guided him, showed him what I needed. He stared into my eyes as he did it, eyes flicking up and down my face as he got into the rhythm of it and I couldn’t stop myself from moving, either. “Don’t stop,” I begged him, and I meant it, I felt like I’d die if he did, my body was on fire and when he slid a finger inside of me I nearly flew up, my hands in fists, clenching at the covers, beating down on the bed, and the heat traveled up, washed up my body and I tensed, forgot to breathe, and then it broke and I broke, I lost myself for a few moments there, and when I found myself again and opened my eyes he was staring at me, this look on his face like he’d discovered the secret to never dying.

“Qi,” he whispered, his chest heaving up and down, “Oh, Qi.”

I lay there for a bit, trying to calm myself down. “You okay, over there?”

“Yes,” he replied, and wrapped his arms around me. “Qi?”

“Yeah?”

“Can I ask you something?”

“Always.”

He tucked his head into my neck. “I want to be honest but I don’t want to hurt you.”

“I want you to be honest with me. Always.”

He nodded into me, and I waited until he found his courage. “It’s just…I don’t…oh, this is so difficult for me, I’m not…”

I smiled into his hair. “You don’t want to actually fuck me, do you?” His body stiffened and he tried to pull away but I just held him. “It’s okay. I swear. We’ll just do what we’ll do, okay?”

“Are you sure?” He did pull away then, and met my eyes. “Are you really sure?”

“I swear to you on my mother’s grave,” I said, and he nodded at that. He knew I meant it, then.

“I’m just not sure how I feel about it. I’m quite confused about my feelings right now and because of that I just don’t think I’m ready. For that, anyhow.”

I smiled at him. “Don’t fret. Look, you need to know I didn’t come here with any expectations. I know my body’s not what you prefer. And I’m not mad about it, that’d be like getting pissed at the sun for rising. It is what it is. Can we just do whatever works for us tonight? And later, maybe we can add Mako to the mix, see where that takes us.”

He laughed then, and swept a hand down to give my ass a good hard squeeze. “Mako wants you, you know. Very badly indeed. He’d be much better at all of this than I am, I can promise you that.”

“I know, and I thought about asking him along this trip. But I wanted that you and I could just do this between us this first time.”

He nodded, and took a deep breath in, letting it out with a gust. “Oh Qi, I do feel better. I was putting myself under so much pressure and I didn’t want to disappoint you.”

“You’re not a disappointment to me.” I meant it, too. “Let’s just take this where it takes us, okay? Can we just leave off what we think we should be doing and just enjoy whatever it is we get up to? We ain’t in a hurry, is what I’m saying.”

He smiled again. “Yes. Thank you. Thank you, Qi.”

“Now that we got that all cleared up, you want me to suck you off?”

“QI!” he practically shouted, mortified, but when I reached around down there I could feel that his little friend thought it was a fine idea.

After I was done, after I’d made him damn near sob and spurt in my mouth and I’d gone and cleaned myself up a little I crawled back into the bed with him, pulling the covers up around us. He was drowsy, cuddling up to me, stroking at my breasts a little. “These are the perfect size,” he murmured, and wrapped a leg around me, his breathing slowing until he fell asleep. This is what I wanted from him; the freedom to touch him, to hold him, to explore him without feeling like we were doing something wrong. Maybe someday he’ll actually fuck me and maybe he won’t. So long as I could do this with him, naked and warm, skin to skin, no pressure, no rules, then I’d be happy. I was, as Wu always likes to say, perfectly content.


	19. Chapter 19

Wu sat on his side of the table, his copy of the final contract in front of him, watching as Qi filed in with Lin and the lawyer, taking their seats across from him. Sotaro settled his pince-nez more firmly on his nose and steepled his fingers together.

“I believe the terms laid out within this final draft are satisfactory to both parties?” he said, and glanced between Wu and Qi.

“They work for me,” Qi replied, and he nodded as well.

“They are quite satisfactory.”

“Excellent. Per Ba Sing Se law, signing this contract will mean that the parties involved will be legally married. Republic City requires a short legal ceremony, and to that effect I have asked Her Honor Judge Sawatdi to preside.” The judge, sitting at the head of the table, put her hands together and nodded politely, getting the same in response from around the room. Sotaro continued. “I defer to my colleague from Zaofu to comply with that city state’s particular laws regarding marriage.”

Bhimadevi drew a sheet of paper from her briefcase. “There is further certification needed in Zaofu; however, I am licensed to preside and it is my intention to do so today as well.”

“I believe we can begin by signing the copies of the contract itself.” Sotaro handed pens to both Qi and Wu and they both paged through several copies of the contract, signing them and then passing them around for Lin as well as both lawyers. The room was silent, for the most part, the only sounds the flipping of pages and the scratching of the nibs on the paper. Sotaro’s secretary left the room for a time and returned pushing a cart with a tea service, quietly passing cups about the room before taking his seat again.

When all of the copies of the contract had been signed the judge from Republic City had the two of them declare their intentions to marry each other and sign off on that paperwork; the procedure from Zaofu was nearly the same. By the end of it all Wu had a slight headache and had taken his spectacles off, rubbing at his temples a bit.

“Here,” Qi said, and he opened up his eyes to see a packet of headache powder being poured into a fresh cup of tea. “Go on, you look like you need it.”

“Oh, Qi. Thank you.” He smiled and got a wink in return. The judge wished them well and excused herself; the lawyers conferred with each other and the secretaries checked various copies of the impressive stack of papers to make sure that everything was properly signed, stamped and distributed. Finally, Sotaro rose from the table with a polite smile.

“Well, then. We are quite finished here. Your Highness, it has been, as always, a pleasure to serve you.” Sotaro nodded to Wu. “And may I be the first to offer our firm’s salutations to you as well, Your Highness.” Another nod to Qi, whose mouth twitched dangerously.

“Oh boy,” muttered Lin, rolling her eyes. She punched Qi gently in the shoulder.

“You can’t do that, I’m royalty now,” Qi said, grinning, and she shook her head.

“My gracious,” Gun said, and he dabbed at his eyes with a handkerchief. “I never thought I would see the day. A Beifong.”

“Your mother would be so proud,” Lady Chun said, and he reached across Gun to take her hand and squeeze it gently.

“Attorney Bhimadevi, it has been my honor to have worked with you. The Beifong family is lucky indeed to have you on retainer.” Sotaro inclined his head her way and she returned his nod just as politely.

“Thank you, Attorney Sotaro. I appreciate your professionalism as well as your many courtesies.”

They all stood up and took up various copies of papers. Wu approached Bhimadevi and bowed politely. “Now that the negotiations are complete I was hoping that you and Prem here,” a nod to the startled secretary, “would have dinner with us tonight before you return to Zaofu.”

For the first time, Bhimadevi smiled. He was struck at how much younger and friendlier it made her look. “Thank you, Your Highness. We’d be honored.”

“Excellent. We’ll send a car for you at six tonight, if that would suffice?”

“I look forward to it, thank you.”

Wu hooked his arm through, Qi’s, waiting for everyone else to catch up before making his way towards the firm’s front door. “Well then. There it is, I suppose.”

“You’re a mother as well as a mother-in-law, Lin, all in one fell swoop.” Lady Chun laughed at the dour look she got, and tapped Lin’s arm with her fan.

“Do I still get my wedding?” Qi had one eyebrow raised.

“Of course. I told you that you would. No holds barred, pull out all the stops. You may have the shindig of the century, my love.”

Gun’s hand flew to his mouth. “Oh, yes! A wedding, a real one!” He gave a nervous glance towards Wu. “Oh! Not that your ceremony with the Prince Consort was not lovely, Your Highness. Intimate. But lovely.”

Wu smiled at him. “It’s all right, Gun. This one will fulfill all your wildest dreams, yes, Qi?”

Qi grinned. “Beyond your wildest dreams. I’m going to need a wedding planner.”

“Of course.”

“And decorators and caterers.”

“I would expect nothing less.”

“And you’re paying for it.”

Wu stopped dead in his tracks. “I beg your pardon?”

“You’re paying for it. It was in the contract.”

“I don’t think so!” He put his hands on his hips.

Lin chuckled. “Oh, it was. Check your copy.”

“Well! That seems awfully underhanded of you!”

“We’re Beifongs,” Lin said, and put an arm around Qi. “Get used to it.”

“Hmph,” was his reply, but he kissed both of them on the cheek and hailed a taxi.


End file.
